5722

I thought part of the reason McCain picked Palin was some weird attempt to also go after women voters… as if women will just vote for a woman because. What’s even weirder… years later after that stunt fails Hilary and several prominent women try and do it again and seem completely shocked when they get backlash for it. Women aren’t going to vote for Hilary just because she’s a woman. And while some people think Obama got the black vote just because he’s black, I can almost guarantee you if Carson had any chance he wouldn’t get all the same votes just because he’s black. He’s as loony a the rest of them.

I’m not a huge a fan of Hilary but I don’t auto-lump her into Bill’s camp as if she didn’t have a mind of her own either. I think her ties to wall street, some of her previous decisions… she’s polarizing on a number of topics. The problem is… Bernie is too but for different reasons.

5723

The secret key to my entire political ideology is that I have almost no faith in other people, either individually or in groups.

5724

I’m considering registering as Democrat and caucusing with the Democrats next week. Unfortunately, I’m truely at lost between nice but naive Sanders, and the competent but corrupt Clinton. I really wish the Democrats had better candidates, forget the policies but neither Sanders nor Hillary are good candidates.
Not in the same league as either Obama, or Bill Clinton, and frankly no better than Al Gore who at least looked Presidential.

But either are better than risking Trump being President.

5725

I’m pretty sure that was her point–that the majority of spending on entitlements (Social Security retirement and Medicare benefits) is (unlike Medicaid) not benefiting poor people.

5726

Actually Medicaid isn’t really an entitlement program; it’s a means tested program, need based. Social Security and Medicare aren’t. It’s one of the reasons why the former, Medicaid, is often targeted by politicians and the latter two are… not as easily targeted. The rich are as entitled to Social Security and Medicare as are the poor. The rich are not entitled to Medicaid. So you could really call Medicaid more of a social program or a protection than an entitlement.

The proposals to save social Security, Especially, and Medicare really changes the nature of those two programs if you cap it and push out the rich.

5727

I understand why from a policy perspective why you’d consider Ted worse than Trump. The problem with Trump is that I fear (and I think with good reason) that he will take the Imperial Presidency to new levels, maybe not Putin levels, but Turkey’s Erdogan. I think even more than Hillary, Trump consider himself above the law. The Presidency already has tendency to corrupt even decent humans, like Sauron’s ring. When you give it to a person with Trump ego, pettiness, and general disdain for others you risk a real disaster.

So, for instance, a President signs an executive order, “No Muslims can enter the country”, the courts say you can’t do that. I think everybody including Ted Cruz obeys the court. I fear Trump tells TSA and Customs to ignore the order. What happens next?
Neither, the courts, Congress or, of course, the Pope control any divisions.

5728

You’re right. Trump doesn’t respect anyone or anything that doesn’t defer to him. That’s a scary thing. He doesn’t care what the law is. He doesn’t care about facts, and he really only goes after perceived enemies which could be anyone who says something bad about him. He targets entire populations of people and casts them aside just to get a few minutes of free advertisements and probably doesn’t miss a minute of sleep when one of his followers beats the crap out of some scary “foreigner”. He doesn’t show any amount of respect towards women really, and he would be the first person to do something covertly awful and then double speak if, if he’s caught.

Despite all that… I look at some of the worst atrocities in human history, and how many of them are backed by some extreme religious viewpoint? I don’t have an issue with someone having a religion, or voicing their religion or even not really having a religion and being in office Slavery, racism, sexism, and even classism all were backed by extreme religious viewpoints, some even mainstream for the time. I don’t think Trump thinks he has more than his mortal powers behind him, but I think Cruz does. If he was elected, how long before we finally have an amendment that gives the USA an official religion? And what would that actually mean?

5729

You forget that there is a third, very popular option, not voting. If it was say Trump vs Jeb, or Kaisch, and possibly Cruz or even Rubio. I think Donald would get his voters to polls and beat them in a head to head contest. More people voted for Donald Trump in Nevada than voted for all the Republican candidates in 2012. Barrack was re-elected by convincing 26% of the population over 18 to vote for him. I don’t see either Hillary or Bernie getting a higher percentage on the basis of people wanting them to become President. They have to be convinced that Trump is scary.

5730

I think Strollen makes a good point. No one I know supports Trump in any fashion. But if the only voters that do show up at polls are Trump’s fanatical supporters then it will be President Trump in 2016.

5731

I completely agree. Sure Hillary is like the anointed one in terms of her political position within the Democrats, but from outside the gold-fish bowl i don’t see her being an automatic win vs Trump with the american electorate (and electoral system).

Not fair really. It is less that people are dumb, and more that they are manipulated and misinformed, it is not their fault more than the propaganda controllers.

5732

The American voter is responsible for Trump. That they are too incurious, too lazy, or too stupid is not the fault of what the media does - the individual is ultimately responsible for arriving at their own conclusions. And being stupid, they arrive at the conclusion that Trump is Presidential material.

(Trigger warning: Salon and RollingStone links incoming)

I hate to have to say it, but the conclusion stares us in the face: We’re a stupid country, full of loud, illiterate and credulous people. Trump has marched straight to the nomination without offering anything like a platform or a plan. With a vocabulary of roughly a dozen words – wall, Mexicans, low-energy, loser, Muslims, stupid, China, negotiate, deals, America, great, again – he’s bamboozled millions of Americans. And it’s not just splenetic conservatives supporting Trump or your garden-variety bigots (although that’s the center of his coalition), it’s also independents, pro-choice Republicans, and a subset of Reagan Democrats.
…
The people are getting what they want, and what they want is to have their idiocies and their discontent beamed back at them. Trump is clearly more than a media construction. He’s everything dumb and regressive about our political culture distilled into a single candidate. And he exists only because a sufficient number of Americans want him to – that’s the problem.

Matt Taibbi: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/america-is-too-dumb-for-tv-news-20151125

It’s our fault. We in the media have spent decades turning the news into a consumer business that’s basically indistinguishable from selling cheeseburgers or video games. You want bigger margins, you just cram the product full of more fat and sugar and violence and wait for your obese, over-stimulated customer to come waddling forth.
…
What we call right-wing and liberal media in this country are really just two different strategies of the same kind of nihilistic lizard-brain sensationalism. The ideal CNN story is a baby down a well, while the ideal Fox story is probably a baby thrown down a well by a Muslim terrorist or an ACORN activist. Both companies offer the same service, it’s just that the Fox version is a little kinkier.

Edit:
And another Taibbi piece: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/how-america-made-donald-trump-unstoppable-20160224

This is part of a gigantic subplot to the Trump story, which is that many of his critiques of the process are the same ones being made by Bernie Sanders. The two men, of course, are polar opposites in just about every way – Sanders worries about the poor, while Trump would eat a child in a lifeboat – but both are laser-focused on the corrupting role of money in politics.

Both propose “revolutions” to solve the problem, the difference being that Trump’s is an authoritarian revolt, while Sanders proposes a democratic one. If it comes down to a Sanders-Trump general election, the matter will probably be decided by which candidate the national press turns on first: the flatulent narcissist with cattle-car fantasies or the Democrat who gently admires Scandinavia. Would you bet your children on that process playing out sensibly?

In the meantime, Trump is cannily stalking the Sanders vote. While the rest of the GOP clowns just roll their eyes at Sanders, going for cheap groans with bits about socialism, Trump goes a different route. He hammers Hillary and compliments Sanders. “I agree with [Sanders] on two things,” he says. “On trade, he said we’re being ripped off. He just doesn’t know how much.”

He goes on. “And he’s right with Hillary because, look, she’s receiving a fortune from a lot of people.”

5733

There still is a Democratic Party, don’t lump us all together.

5734

I know. This political season is just so rage inducing. /sigh

5735

And this is part of the problem, total complacency in relation to Fox News (the the usa specifically) and how it shapes the thinking of the GOP and wider Republican supporters. And it is not a usa only problem, the Sun newspaper in the uk serves the same exact purpose, and is run by the same people, for the same reasons, with the same outcomes, a growing radical extreme right view amongst the (typically) working class.

All of the things Trump talks about, and how he talks about them, are often exactly the same as you have been able to see on Fox News in the usa for decades now. It’s dangerous stuff, to be dismissed at the cost of our democracies ultimately. Fox News is very much why Trump is where he is currently.

5736

That only true if you define “politician” very narrowly as “someone who runs for office.” If you expand it out to include stuff like “having a policy” or “leading a constituency” of “finding solutions for the issue facing the people”, then Trump is a pretty weak politician.

5737

To the best of my knowledge, the narrow definition is largely the correct one in US politics, no?

5738

That’s actually a tough question to answer seriously. Certainly we’ve been conditioned by the media to view “politician” as a byword for saying anything simply to get elected. And at the national level in the last couple years, yeah… it’s tough to think of Congresspersons or Senators as anything other than partisan warriors who are solely interested in getting elected so they can block the other guys’ agendas.

But for President and certainly politicians at the lower level (state reps, mayors, city councilpersons, etc.), it’s less about the running and more about the governing. You need a platform and plans and you need to be able to demonstrate an ability to respond to the needs of your constituents. You know - POLICY.

Still, the old chestnut comes to mind: “A Statesman is simply a dead politician.”

5739

Medicaid is definitely an entitlement program. An entitlement has real legal protections for beneficiaries. IE, the government must pay for the benefits of an entitlement program. If you qualify for Medicaid, you get benefits if the funds are available. You have a legal right attached to the program. Medicaid is an entitlement program mostly aimed at lower-income families. Entitlements are also considered mandatory spending as they aren’t subject to normal process. Essentially what they cost, the govt spends unless the govt acct paying for it is bankrupt.

Quick note on Palin: Her story before the 2008 election melt-down was that she was a woman who beat the establishment, boys club, crony corrupt R’s of Alaska. She was seen as inspirational by beating the status quo establishment. That was her initial story when McCain picked her. Then she turned out to be a very poor choice. But McCain needed to reach out to the conservative wing and Palin was seen as fulfilling that niche as well as appealing to women.

5740

Well the middle class now pays income taxes on SS in most cases. It doesn’t take much other income to make SS taxable.

And medicare is probably what ACA should be.

5741

I think it is fair to say Trump’s success may be in part contributed to the groundwork Fox News has laid in the past 8 years, but I also think you would be wrong if you thought Fox News favored a Trump presidency. I think the success of Trump is as much a mystery to Fox as it is to everyone else.